[Horse Races]. Horse Race Betting Tickets and Bag of a Felonious Bookmaker.

[South Shields, Tyne and Wear, England, ca 1900-1905].

Collection of approximately 300 original betting cards, produced and intended for soliciting bets, sixty years before gambling was made legal. Three complete of sets of illustrated printed betting tickets, 100, 200, and 500 numbered series, respectively, each measuring 95 x 50 mm. Featuring an engraved illustration of English jockey Frederick Archer, a famously daring and successful Victorian rider who won most or possibly all of the great English turf prizes and accumulated a large fortune. Tickets are printed in Leeds, with stamp in bottom margin reading J. Richardson, "Bookmaker's Outfitter," Sporteries Leeds. Contained in the shoulder bag Charles Drew, English bookmaker who was arrested for charges of illegally soliciting bets on at least one occasion in 1901. Leather shoulder bag measuring 340 x 240 mm, with original strap, working clasps, inner pockets, his name in gilt to one side. Very good condition.

 4,500.00

Little is known of gambling bookie Charles Drew, but that his residence and business were based in South Shields, Tyne and Wear, in Northeast England, he married Ann Brown on 19 Jul 1852 at the South Shields St. Hilda parish church, and that he actively, illegally solicited gambling on streets by circulating betting cards for horse races. On 15 March 1901, the South Shields Daily Gazette reported on Drew's illegal activities: "At South Shields to-day, Charles Drew, bookmaker, was charged with betting East Street on Thursday last." Detective Sanderson and other officers deposed to the defendant being in the street taking bets in the usual way from 12 p.m. till 3 p.m. on the day named..." Several decades later, the gambling pastime which was already firmly entrenched in British culture would finally become a legal pastime. 1 September 1960, BBC: "1 January 1961 gambling for small sums will be legal for games of skill [...] betting shops will take gambling off the streets [...] At the moment, anyone who wants to place a bet on the horses has to demonstrate they have enough credit to set up an account with a bookmaker and do their dealings by telephone".

Stock Code: BN#44074 Tags: ,